Damn you, Wheeljack!
by Fierceawakening
Summary: Good old fashioned Decepticrack. Wheeljack's latest device, designed to magnify Starscream's disloyalty and obnoxiousness, backfires, rendering him polite and obedient. What will Megatron do about such a terrible turn of events?


Megatron paced his quarters, his optics gleaming in rage and frustration. This was intolerable... and for once in his long life, he had absolutely no idea what to do about it.

It was all the fault of that Autobot scientist, the one whose inventions always went wrong. He clenched a dark fist, snarling.

It wasn't that one of the fool's inventions had finally worked. If the blasted thing _had _worked, it would have been irritating, but nothing he couldn't handle. No, the damned thing had, of course, failed spectacularly. But his enemy's failure had proven a far greater problem than success would have.

The thing had been designed to alter personality. To exaggerate one's quirks and foibles and tendencies to their highest degree. A cowardly mech hit by the ray would go from retreating too quickly in battle to cowering at any sound. A greedy one would go from slyly making deals to brazenly stealing. An egotistical one would go from bragging to challenging everyone, however unrealistic.

And a defiant one - so the idea was - would become completely intractable, unable to resist letting even a moment go by without getting in his superiors' way, if not openly challenging them.

That had been the idea, at least. Wheeljack had hit Starscream with the thing, thinking that Megatron already lost valuable time and energy dealing with his thousands of petty rebellions. If, he'd reasoned, he made it even worse, the Decepticon leader would simply be too busy handling him to worry about his real enemies.

Megatron snarled again and punched the wall. Obligingly, it gave. He pulled his fist from the dent, cycling air through his vents in a half-pant, half-sigh. It would have been fine if that had happened. Megatron had been dealing with Starscream's petty tantrums for millions of years. Dealing with a few more of them until Hook repaired him would have been nothing more than a nuisance.

Instead, the thing had done the exact opposite of what it was supposed to do. Far from exaggerating Starscream's defiance, the thing had reversed it entirely. Starscream had spent the past few days praising Megatron's every decision and throwing himself whole-sparkedly into any duty his leader assigned him. Then, when he was finished, he would stand at perfect attention, silent and ready, awaiting his orders with as much patience as Soundwave.

Megatron didn't mind the quiet here, in his personal quarters. That was, after all, why he devoted so much of his time to keeping his locks Starscream-proof in the first place. But the base itself felt silent as a tomb without that familiar voice screeching out complaints, unshakable and awful and comforting as a ghost.

He'd instructed Hook to fix Starscream as soon as possible, and he knew the Constructicons were working on it, but the going was slower than it should have been. The sudden change in behavior had helped turn the tide of the last battle... and besides, far too many of the Decepticons found the situation entertaining.

He could just put the fear of Primus into them for that. Everyone knew that Hook and the others were dawdling, after all. While they might wonder why Megatron wanted his Second back to normal so badly, none of them would be able to deny that they deserved punishment for being so slow about it all.

Exasperated as he was right now - with Starscream, with them, with himself - he had to admit the thought was sorely tempting. But right now, he couldn't trust himself to reveal his anger without totally losing control. To do that at all was bad enough. To do it in front of them would be to hand the Autobots a victory the extent of which they could never even guess at. No, he couldn't say or do anything more than he already had. Not until he calmed down.

But how in this galaxy or any other was he supposed to calm down, when his usual method of blowing off steam was totally unavailable to him? The fuel roiled in his tanks, thinking of how Starscream would react if Megatron called him in. Confessing his failures. Hanging his head. Thanking Megatron for reminding him of his place.

It was enough to make him retch. Not wanting the indignity of purging his tank on top of all his other misfortune this week, he punched the wall again to take his mind off the thought, bellowing loudly enough to be heard in the far corner of the base.

He would have to take matters into his own hands. Something had to be done about this, and soon. The Decepticon leader didn't know how much more of it he could take.

He paced again, his footfalls rapid and restless. He would have to do something drastic, something awful, something so incredibly stupid it would jolt the Seeker's logic circuits back into their normal settings. He'd have to come up with a plan so horrid that Starscream - the real Starscream - would rise from whatever place Wheeljack's reprogramming had buried him, unable to keep back his rebuke any longer.

But what could he do? It would take something absolutely ridiculous to override the effects of the device, given that Starscream had been like this for days...

He grinned, his optics flashing brightly as the idea seized him.

It was, quite simply, the stupidest idea he could possibly imagine.

His dark hand trembling with excitement, he tapped his chest. "Megatron to Constructicons."

"Lord Megatron? Hook here." The voice on the other end of the comm link was clearly nervous. "We're working as hard as we can on fixing Starscream, sir. It's just that... uh... well, we need a... er... deregulating switch, and..."

Megatron could hear another of them scoffing in response, quietly, doubtless thinking he was out of range to be picked up over the comm. "Did you really just tell him we need a _deregulating switch? _We're slagged."

Silence followed the comment, lengthening into awkwardness.

"Never mind that," Megatron snapped.

"Sir?"

"Forget about Starscream." A grin spread slowly over the tyrant's faceplates. "I have need of you for something far greater."

He heard a sharp exhalation of air through someone's vents. Hook, most likely, sighing his relief. "Yes?"

Megatron chuckled, infinitely pleased with himself. "Build me a giant purple griffin."


End file.
